BOSTON — At the Winter Meetings, Baltimore Orioles manager Buck Showalter was surrounded by a crowd of media, asked about the difference between this year and last year for Baltimore.

“There’s more people here,” Showalter said with a glance around. “It was quiet last year.”

Indeed, an out-of-the-blue 93-win season that included the Orioles’ first playoff berth in 15 seasons has revitalized the former doormat of the American League East. Reversing the inertia of longtime losing may be the hardest step toward becoming a winner. But it’s only the first one.

“It’s a given with Boston and New York and Toronto,” said Showalter. “It’s a given to me for a different reason with Tampa. We’re going to have to keep grinding to stay up with them.”

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Baltimore was an enigma in baseball last season -- a team that kept winning close games from April straight through into October. While everyone waited for the O’s to cave, they trucked on through two-time defending pennant winner Texas in the wildcard game all the way to a Game Five at Yankee Stadium in the Division Series.

Now the Orioles are out to prove it wasn’t a one-year fluke; that the plus-seven run differential doesn’t mean they overachieved, that a 29-9 record in one-run games and a 16-2 mark in extra innings are, at some level, replicable.

Even Showalter acknowledges the questions are justified.

“I would (question its sustainability) if I was handicapping it. Just the odds alone. You wouldn’t think that could happen,” the manager said. “But the players have such a quiet confidence in those situations. They wouldn’t talk about it in the dugout. They were happy.”

Baltimore’s biggest strength in 2012, and the primary reason for that astonishing success in tight games, was its bullpen. Jim Johnson had a team-record 51 saves. Pedro Strop, Luis Ayala, Darren O’Day and Troy Patton all pitched at least 50 innings with an ERA under 3.00.

Everyone knows that relief pitching is a fickle commodity; the small samples for relievers lead to capricious results that can vacillate greatly from year to year. Showalter isn’t worried about that, though.

“Non-closer relievers are very cyclable over history,” he said. “I’ve got a group that I feel real comfortable that last year wasn’t something they’re not capable of doing again.”

Showalter did, however, focus on the importance of his starting staff providing more consistency, in terms of quality and quantity of innings.

“Our bullpen will not be good if we’re really struggling with our starters,” he added.

Baltimore will enter 2013 without a real No. 1 starter. Only lefty Wei-Yin Chen made more than 20 starts for the O’s last season, and even he fell short of 200 innings. That said, by the end of the season, the Orioles rotation had rounded into form, with Chris Tillman, Miguel Gonzalez and late-season addition Joe Saunders proving reliable. Again, whether that success can be carried out over a full season in 2013 is a question of considerable heft for Baltimore.

One of the reasons for optimism, though, is the returning health in the lineup. Adam Jones and Matt Wieters will once again be counted on to anchor the middle of the order, but the Orioles hope for full seasons from corner outfielders Nick Markakis and Nolan Reimold. Markakis was nearly as productive as the MVP candidate Jones last year, but he played in only 104 games. Reimold was off to a sizzling start with five homers in his first 11 games; he played in only 16 all season.

Baltimore is also looking forward to a healthy season from second baseman Brian Roberts, who’s played in only 115 games the last three years because of concussion issues.

And then there’s a full season slated for Manny Machado, the top prospect who more than held his own after being called up from Double A last August. Machado’s defense alone proved a major upgrade at third base, and he possesses the potential to be a middle-of-the-order bat, as well.

The hardest thing for the Orioles to sustain might just be that je-ne-sais-quoi atmosphere that carried them to the postseason. Thus far, Showalter has been excited by the lack of satisfaction felt by his players after the surprising 2012.

“Trusting the people that we have, like I do, and knowing their makeup and talking to them a lot this offseason, there’s a pretty good fire there that’s been ignited,” he said. “And there was a different look in a lot of our guys’ eyes at that time of year (in October). Now that they’ve got a taste of it, I feel real confident that they’ll continue to pay the price to do the things it takes to get there.”